July 22, 1996

Hong Kong Hoping to Win Its First Medal

By EDWARD A. GARGAN

ONG KONG -- As the day of her departure for the Olympic Games approached, Chan Tan-lui, lanky, mongoose-quick and irrepressible, was worried. Not about whether she would
win a medal in Atlanta, though that would be nice. Not about whether the food would be edible -- she goes to college in Australia, not well known for its cuisine.

Rather, she worried about whether Atlanta, which she imagined as some sort of Third World backwater, would have modern appliances.

"They will have air conditioning?" she asked, not quite imploringly. "They will, won't they?"

This is the second Olympics for the 27-year-old table tennis player and her last as a representative of this 150-year-old British colony. What happens in four years, well after the territory is reabsorbed by China on July 1, 1997, remains
unclear, including the question of whether Hong Kong will continue to have its own Olympic team.

But as the sun sets on British colonialism, a triumph seems possible this year. Three of the 23 athletes on the colony's last Olympic team are considered, at least here, contenders for Hong Kong's first medal in Olympic competition.

The most promising is Lee Lai-shan, currently the world champion in windsurfing. The daughter of the proprietor of a windsurfing shop, Lee has surfed Hong Kong's shark-ridden waters and the waves of the world. In the world championships
this year, she finished second to Maud Herbert of France.

"If she reaches her potential in the competition, she will do very well indeed," her coach, Rene Appel, told Hong Kong's South China Morning Post. "A medal will be the byproduct of a good performance."

Hong Kong's other medal hopes rest on the shoulders of Chan and Chai Po-wa, who is currently the fifth-ranked women's table tennis player in the world. For both, however, the problem has been finding adequate training places and
sufficiently competitive opponents.

"I started playing when I was 8," said Chan, who was born in Beijing but who immigrated to Hong Kong a decade ago. "I used to train here, but last year I went to the University of Canberra. I've played the men's players
there but, frankly, they're not very good. So I went to China a month ago. They're very good."

In doubles, the two Hong Kong women are seeded third, a placement that may enhance their chances.

Hong Kong's Olympic efforts began in 1952, with two male and two female swimmers. They set the prevailing precedent by returning empty-handed, but Arnaldo de O. Sales, the president of the Hong Kong Olympic committee, slogged on.

"It gets tougher every year," said Sales, who has been with each of Hong Kong's teams since 1952. "In Barcelona, we had 60 athletes in 11 sports. Now, in so many sports, we have to qualify to standards set by the international
federations. You'll note that in no team sport have we qualified. We're just not up to the standard internationally."

Indeed, for many in Hong Kong, including Sales, the whole idea of a Hong Kong Olympic team borders on the bizarre.

"Of course," Sales said, "our standard is not up to the standard of top countries. And second, our social priorities are different. For the man in the street, education is the top priority. No family would go in for sport. They
would like their children to go to university. Sport has been the underdog in social priorities."

And while his expectations for medals this year are higher than in any of the previous 11 Olympics in which Hong Kong has competed, his frustrations become apparent when he is asked about what the future may hold under Chinese rule.

"We will still have our national Olympic Committee," he said. "We are recognized by the International Olympic Committee. Hong Kong has a separate identity that has been established. Article 149 of the Basic Law," a sort
of miniconstitution for Hong Kong after it reverts to Chinese sovereignty, "guarantees that Hong Kong can participate in some activities separately as 'Hong Kong, China.' "

But despite these assurances, the actual vagueness of the article he cited does leave doubt about Hong Kong's future status in the Olympics.

In China, there is no more sensitive sporting event than the Olympics, and Beijing's loss to Sydney as the host of the Games in 2000 was seen in China as the result of an imperialist conspiracy led by the United States.

Chan, the table tennis hope, is not worried about Hong Kong's Olympic participation.

"I think we'll always have a team," she said. "At least some team."

For Sales, the fact that Hong Kong, a city of 6.2 million people, can field a team at all remains a source of delight.

"Actually, our national sport is the pursuit of the dollar," Sales said. "In that sport, we are in the premier league."